Yankees' Adam Warren is an all-in-one pitcher

NEW YORK – Adam Warren was aware of his 20-for-20 as he entered Monday night’s game against the White Sox.

The right-hander had retired all 20 batters he’d faced this season, over his first four relief appearances. And he ran that streak to 22 in relief of Jordan Montgomery before a seventh-inning walk to Tyler Saladino. Melky Cabrera’s eighth-inning bloop hit ended Warren's hitless streak and the scoreless run ended in the ninth.

“A lot of firsts for the season,’’ Warren said of his 2.1-inning outing, after the Yanks ran their winning streak to eight straight games with a 7-4 victory at the Stadium. “So, now we can get down to pitching and not worrying about all that.’’

Of course, the easy-going Warren wasn’t really concerned with “all that.’’ He was just trying to go “as many innings as I could and save the bullpen.’’

Warren lost out in the competition to fill the last two spots in the starting rotation, but he figured he was a long shot to escape his multi-faceted relief role anyway.

“I knew being able to do certain things in the bullpen was going to hurt me, and Larry (Rothschild, the pitching coach) was pretty up front with me in spring training.’’

In other words, Warren's pen experience could work against him. And it pretty much did.

“Again, I want to be a starter. But I do relish being counted on also in certain roles,’’ Warren said. “I was talking to Dellin (Betances) about how much he warmed up because I take a lot of pride in keeping him out of the game.

“I know I tell myself that there’s value in that.’’

He doesn’t have to tell Joe Girardi that.

“He’s a bridge. He’s a fill-in, in a sense,’’ the Yankees' manager said. “The seventh, the eighth, ninth inning, whatever I need. He just (provides) a lot of diversity to our bullpen. And it’s a really important guy who can handle a number of different roles.’’

And Warren says it “speaks to the depth of our team’’ to be riding an eight-game winning streak without Gary Sanchez and Didi Gregorius, both on the disabled list.

“You lose a couple of your best players and you’re still winning. (It) shows how deep this team is, how good the pitching is,’’ Warren said. “Yeah, I just love the chemistry on this team. It doesn’t really surprise me as much as maybe it surprises other people.

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